Our new 55 gallon

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Alrighty. I rearranged all the plants. The back of the tank is a little bare, but I have some anacharis coming so it'll be ...

Alrighty. I rearranged all the plants. The back of the tank is a little bare, but I have some anacharis coming so it'll be filled in when that arrives. I moved my anubia plants to the mid-ground and put the sprites on the sides up front. I moved my wisteria plants to the sides in the back since those should be getting taller than the sprites (those having been showing some nice growth lately). My java fern is still just hanging out. It's never looked that great, but I've been getting tiny growths on the ends of the leaves I have now, so maybe it's slowly finally adjusting. I have some Flourish on the way too finally, so I'm hoping that'll perk up my plants :)

Came home a half hour ago to find all my fish gasping at the top of the tank for air. I freaked out thinking the silk ivy I put at the top of the tank last night wasn't cleaned well enough and was poisoning my fish! I decided to check the water first, and found my ammonia had plummeted from 1ppm to .25ppm. My nitrites are at .25 and my nitrates are at 5. I was relieved to see that the tank is finally taking care of this ammonia, but didn't think the nitrites were a problem since I've been treating with Prime to neutralize the ammonia. I just dosed for neutralization this morning, so I quick did a partial water change (not wanting to mess up my mini-cycle) and watched the fish slowly go back down away from the surface of the tank. I turned on the bubbler to increase circulation, and am going to remove the ivy until I get a powerhead as it's really inhibiting the flow of my spray bar and obviously affecting the oxygen level in the tank. Which is sad because my gourami have loved this dense cover over half of the tank.

Eek! We have brown algae That's ok, right? From what I've found from searching it's more than likely diatomes. It's on the top of my Colosseum and there are a few spots smaller than a dime on my tank walls. I've noticed specks on some of my plants as well. I'm hoping it clears up on it's own once the tank is stable again?

Sounds like it, and yes. Once your system gets a little bit more established, that should go. How are the fish doing? Everything okay in there? That last post got me nervous for you!

The fish seem fine. A few of my black phantom tetras have been acting a little strangely off and on for a couple weeks. I've looked into their actions and it appears they are in the mood to spawn. Nothing has happened yet, but they are always circling each other and flaring at each other, and last night I noticed some of them swimming towards each other then going sideways past each other then once they passed one another they went straight again. They're so goofy. My ammonia spiked again today, but I'm still dosing with Prime. I started doing less water changes because I think I'm killing my bacteria off when I change. I'll just continue dosing Prime to neutralize everything then do a weekly water change instead of daily.

One of my tanks went through a phase of the same brown stuff you're talking about. This was one of my earlier tanks that I actually put through the cycle fully without transferred filter media. Water changes didn't really do much but for a day. What helped was during the water changes I used a never before used sponge on the glass and a new toothbrush on all decor and plants. I think the scrubbing is what got rid of it over time.

Added a piece of driftwood on Saturday. I boiled it for a few hours then soaked it until the evening, then added it in. I am loving the tint from the tannins, and it's slowly lowering our high ph. It's got a little bit of fungus growth (from being new I imagine) but my guppy has been going after that like crazy. We also picked up another tiny pleco since "Playco" had passed away. This time we got an albino bristlenose. Gabe isn't as nearly attached to this one as he was the rubberlip. What's funny is that I made sure I got the driftwood because I didn't want it to end up meaning the pleco couldn't thrive, and the silly bugger hasn't gone near the wood once! HAHA! *sigh* oh well!